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HIDALGO — Excitement builds with the chatter over the radio of the Border Patrol's state-of the-art sport utility vehicle. “Omaha,” code word for a helicopter far out of earshot and cloaked by the night sky, has zoomed invisible lasers on movement on the Mexican side.

But the chatter ebbs, and he confirms that searchlights aimed across the dank Rio Grande have scared the group back. Better to have them not try crossing at all, he says, though there was little doubt they'd try again.

As the vehicle bumps along the south side of Hidalgo County's 18-foot high concrete levee-wall, there comes a moment of chagrin. A homemade wooden ladder lies along the earthen path. Hoisted, it was almost exactly the height of the wall. Fresh footprints mean immigrants cleared the barrier within the past hour. The radio crackles with another agent's report that their trail ended at a road, indicating they met their pickup and were likely already lost in the traffic on U.S. 83.

“Welcome to America,” Sievert says.

Immigration and border security have been key topics during the recent Republican presidential debates, particularly by candidates looking to shame Gov. Rick Perry, who often jokes that building a 30-foot fence along the entirety of the 2,000-mile border would only create a market for 35-foot ladders.

“I would build a fence on America's southern border on every mile, on every yard, on every foot, on every inch of the southern border,” U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn, said during the Sept. 22 debate, a clear jab at Perry. Said former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, “We have to have a fence, we have to have enough Border Patrol agents to secure the fence.” But some who live on the border and have studied the issue question whether putting more money into the Border Patrol or a fence would really help stem the flow of drugs and illegal immigration.

After just half a shift with the Border Patrol on a recent night, it's clear that despite the long lines of fencing, the lasers and infrared, the helicopters, patrol boats, swarms of new agents and extra eyes and ears of the National Guard, people still are getting across. Southbound currency seizures mean drugs still are making it to market.

“If you showed me a picture of a wall from California all the way to Texas, would I say our border is safer? No. Criminals will innovate,” said Claudia San Miguel, director of the criminal justice program at Texas A&M International University in Laredo.

Crime statistics so far indicate that the extreme violence of Mexico's drug war has stayed in that country. Data meanwhile show a massive drop in the number of illegal immigrants apprehended by the Border Patrol, with a corresponding rise in the amount of seized drugs, interpreted by the Obama administration as proof that deterrence is working to concentrate efforts on contraband.

But as the 2012 presidential election year approaches, there's no shortage of ideas on what to do next.

Perry wants more National Guard, still more Border Patrol. He has said the state under his leadership has poured $400 million of taxpayer money into border security. Shawn Moran, vice president of the National Border Patrol Council and a 14-year veteran of the agency, said he's not convinced the answer is sending in more agents. Rural stretches of the border are dangerous, he said, and when agents go out into the field they don't know if they're going to find exhausted immigrants, desperate drug mules or bandits who prey on illicit commerce.

He'd like to see immigration curbed in other ways, like sanctioning employers.

“We don't know if 20,000 people can secure the border because we've never been allowed to do it the way it needs to be done,” he said. “I think it could be done, and maybe we need a few thousand more people, but we really don't know at this point.”

U.S. Rep. Silvestre Reyes, D-El Paso, a former Border Patrol sector chief, has called for more U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers to be assigned to international bridges that he says are woefully understaffed. Those ports are a major entry point for drugs, Reyes said. He's introduced a bill that calls for hiring thousands of CBP officers, agricultural inspectors and support personnel and $5 billion in infrastructure improvements at ports of entry.

And then there's U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, R-Clute, who said the United States needs to get out of the war on drugs altogether.

“We've spent over a trillion dollars on this war in the last 40 years, and I fear the war on drugs more than I fear the drugs themselves,” Paul told Comedy Central's Jon Stewart.But while he advocates decriminalization of drugs, Paul, also a hopeful for the GOP presidential nomination, has come out strongly in favor of more resources being sent to the southern border to curb illegal immigration.

Several key routes in Mexico lead immigrants to Texas' Rio Grande Valley, and that sector will likely remain active. Still, there's no question the human crossings are down. Apprehensions were 169,151 in 1999. Last year they were 59,766. As for drugs, it's been a banner year — a week short of the new fiscal year, marijuana seizures were close to 1 million pounds — a record.

For the expanding ranks of men and women in Border Patrol green, the challenge remains keeping on top of the smugglers, whether it be sealing off drainage pipes or knowing the terrain to quickly detect new smuggling trails, often blazed through wildlife preserves.

It's also taking away the ladders (there's now a growing collection in the McAllen station), and keeping an eye out for drugs being squeezed through, or lobbed over, the fence.

An agent's voice interrupts a brief lull in noise from the radio.

“We're all set up,” it says.

It means agents along the levees and in the brush are waiting, anticipating activity, likely in an area that's become hot for illegal activity.

“A lot of what we do is kind of like hunting,” explained Supervisory agent Daniel Milian. “Sitting in a blind, and just waiting for that one opportunity.”